My career in accounting has been shaped by significant projects that demanded meticulous attention and strategic thinking. One notable experience with Federal Retirees involved a multi-year project including IT, Membership & Recruitment departments, and finance consolidate membership and receipt processing from National and 84 branches to the Head Office and enhance control over both membership and revenue tracking.

Original process included 20% cash/cheque member receipts, of which half was processed at the 84 branches and each calculated the quarterly per capita remittances to send to National, which were received with manual membership lists to be updated in the national system. As the branches were not subject to audit, and no substantive evidence could be provided on those revenues, the Association -like most membership groups- consistently received a qualified audit opinion.

This comprehensive project included the introduction of a national web-based membership database and archival payment records. Processing of payments at branches was discontinued and all receipts were forwarded to National. This led to immediate membership updates and payment tracking as well as formal calculation of the branch share of dues. A centralized system also provided the perfect opportunity to introduce a credit card payment option for dues, which could be linked to the system and reducing the cash/cheque receipts to 3-4% annually. The Association also offers members partner benefits with active membership. As part of the new system, we created a CASL compliant verification for use by these third parties to validate eligibility.

Overall, these improvements created substantive supporting evidence over dues receipts, with a third party verification process, leading to the Association's financial statements received unqualified audited opinion status for the first time in its 55+ year history.

With a proactive approach to problem-solving, I deliver consistently high-quality work and contribute positively to any team or organization. As with any business, different stakeholder want to see the numbers from different perspectives, depending on the situation. The one-off reports can be time-consuming and short-notice. Planning ahead and anticipating needs, with a dash of creativity can yeild amazing results. I our particular organization, we had multiple departments contributing to one mandated goal or working cross-department, making budeting and tracking particularly challenging.

Static statements are absolutely necessary for audit, CRA, banking, etc. But varying views bring new insights. A full redesign and reprogramming in Sage300 gave us this abilty. Using the static nature accounts, and building out segmentation by mandate, function, department, district, and project/job-cost, I was able to build new an innovative statements for all stakeholders at the push of a button. 

As with some charities, we were proudly able to support that $0.79 of every dollar went to our mandated goals. Departments could budget and track their expenses, even if contributing to another department or project. Certain project had government reporting requirements easily met with a push-button report. From 2019-2023 the Association included the statement by function & mandate in the notes to the Audited financial statements.